You Lit The Fire (But I Brought The Matches)
by HannahCake310
Summary: The guy on the ground couldn't be older than twenty two or three. His hair must have been blonde at one point but now looked black as blood caked it down. Leonard didn't expect him to open his eyes so he pulled out his phone ready to call for an ambulance when a hand shot up grabbing his wrist in a hard grip making Len jump and try to jerk away. He couldn't. The hold was too tight.


**For the prompt " _Jim is mugged/attacked in an alleyway at night and Bones finds him hurt and takes him back to his place to help him._ " **

* * *

The day was not perfect, the sun was not shining, the birds did not sing and the air had a definite chill to it.

It was around eight thirty or so when Len left the hospital to begin his walk home. The night was still relatively early in his book but he was tired. He'd worked a double and for some ungodly reason yesterday when he'd left his home he had decided to walk instead of taking his car. It wasn't too far, a few blocks down the street that he'd taken kindly to yesterday but now it could've been ten miles for how exhausted the doctor was. His eyes drooped with sleep that his body yearned for. He should stop by the grocery on the corner to get food but that seemed like too much work so instead he walked feeling the overcast sky bearing down on him mirroring his mood. Rain was evident in the heavy clouds as he continued to place one foot in front of the other.

Len rounded a corner passing by a bar he'd gone to way more times since the divorce than he'd admit to. He would've even stopped in again tonight if he wasn't already so dead on his feet. The door to the bar opened as he passed and music blared as a woman stumbled out in a skirt too short and heals too high. The music was then cut off when the door shut back closed abruptly. He continued his walk mentally counting cracks in the concrete.

It was a groan that caught his attention as he rounded another corner. Len stopped to listen, ten years as a trauma surgeon forcing his legs to halt and instinct to prepare himself. He only had to wait a handful of seconds before the groan sounded again coming from an alleyway to his right. Len slowly crept down the alley just as the last rays of sunlight that had been trying to break through the heavy clouds disappeared from sight and everything became dark as night set in. The streetlight threw a slim light down the alley but still Len could hardly see. He kept walking hands clenched and body tense.

A whimper, Len had almost walked right past it not being able to see the figure lying on the ground to his right. He whipped around to see a man on his side. His pants were undone, shirt ripped and blood covered his face. Len knelt down falling into doctor mode in an instant. "Hey. Hey, kid."

The guy on the ground couldn't be older than twenty two or three. His hair must have been blonde at one point but now looked black as blood caked it. Len didn't expect him to open his eyes so he pulled out his phone ready to call for an ambulance when a hand shot up grabbing his wrist in a hard grip making Len jump and try to jerk away. He couldn't. The hold was too tight.

"Don't." The guy whispered holding on very firmly for someone who just got the shit beat out of them. "No… hospital."

"Sir? Can you hear me? You're hurt," Len tried being professional. "I need to call 9-1-1."

A beat, then, "Please, don't. Don't call the 'ops." His speech was slurred as he opened his eyes as wide as his swollen lids would allow. Blood glinted in the moonlight as it gushed from his nose and ears.

"I need to-" Len tried but the man below him cried out.

"No! Jus' leave me 'lone!" He yelled breathlessly but still with more than enough pleading in his voice to stop Len's wondering fingers over his phone. The hand that had been holding onto Len let go falling to the ground. Len cursed but put his phone down as his eyes gave the kid another once over. Jesus, bruises were already blooming over his chest from what he could see. His lip was split in several places along with an obviously broken nose and a black eye that was valiantly working to cut off the vision in his right eye. It looked like a mugging but then his pants were undone… Len shook his head, he couldn't think about that right now. This guy was either the victim or the aggressor but Len wasn't about to play judge and jury at the moment. It was his job to heal and so he did. He grabbed for the man's arm checking for broken bones working his way up to his chest and grabbing the tattered shirt bringing it up to see the man's chest.

"What's your name, kid?" He asked. The guy said nothing staring at Len with glassy eyes, mouth clamped shut. "Look, I just want to-"

"If you're 'ere ta beat me up 's too late. Som'un got m'already." The kid's words were warped as if he let them sit in his mouth for too long. There was blood pooling from both his ears. Someone probably boxed them. Shit.

"Jesus, kid. What happened?"

"Jim… Kirk. Jim…" Guy whispered when Len peeled back a bloody scrap of what once was a nice grey shirt. More gashes on his chest. Cuts and clear fist bruises.

"W-Who are you?" Jim looked around the alley he lay in as if he hadn't been here the entire time. His speech was still slurred and eyes troubled and confused. He looked up at Len and Len could see fear washing over his face. "Get th' fuck away fr'm me!"

Between one second and the next Jim had his arm cocked back and swung at Len. It was overzealous, however, and missed by a mile glancing off. Jim started breathing hard as his sloppy fist came to the ground and he sagged.

Len took a second, a long second, to stare down at the kid before it clicked.

His eyes were too open, too wide. His pupils were blown too big and his arm movements were too clumsy. His speech was a little too slurred and the stuttering was way too much. He smelled more like blood than booze. He was too far gone to be just shitfaced drunk which means that guy might be… A stone dropped in Len's stomach and he almost threw up all he'd eaten during his shift break. Fuck, this just got worse. The kid was _drugged_. Someone had fucking drugged this guy, tried to have their way with him then beat the shit out of him and left when their prey had proven too difficult, not worth the trouble. Shit. This kid's fight might've saved him from something more horrible than just a drugging and an attempt.

"Don' hurt me." Jim had been looking up at him with his too big eyes tearing Len from his thoughts. He couldn't think about that right now. Now he needed to get the kid home or at least to someplace not in the dark and dirty alleyway.

"I'm not gonna hurt you, Jim. Alright? I promise I'm here to help, remember? I'm a doctor. My names Leonard and I heal people. I mend their bones," he spoke in the voice usually reserved for the severely injured and sick. Lighter and warmer than his day-to-day cadence of speech. It also always used to placate Joanna when she got fussy. "Do you know where you live?"

A line appeared between the man's brows. He frowned, his eyes became droopy. "I… don't 'member." Then his eyes slid shut.

 _Shit_. Len needed to get out of here. The guy who did this could come back. He needed to get the kid up. He needed to go to the hospital – wait, no hospital. Right.

 _Shit. Shit. Shit._

 _Fine_. To his apartment they would go. Len bent down to grab hold of the kid being mindful of his injuries. He fixed up the kid's clothes zipping and tucking to let the younger man keep some of his dignity then ran a hand through his hair before bending down again.

"Good god man," he grunted as he lifted.

He pulled him to his feet catching him as his dead weight drew Len down. As luck would have it a taxi zipped around the corner and he put his hand out. The driver stopped and Len opened the door helping Jim in first then sliding in himself. He gave the cabbie his address then sat back holding Jim to his chest and praying that he didn't throw up. When they arrive at his apartment Len threw money at the man and muscled Jim out of the cab. The cabbie either didn't notice that Jim was covered in blood or didn't care. Either way Len let Jim rest most of his weight on his shoulder while they rode the elevator up to his apartment. Throwing the door open he helped Jim to the couch, the kid's eyes started to flutter behind the lids as he sat him down gently. Len ran to shut the door and lock it then turned on every light in the house before grabbing his medkit he kept under the sink. He ran back into the living room just as Jim started to sit up. Len came around seeing the kid really for the first time. He was good looking, that wasn't something Len could deny. He was right in his earlier assumption of the kid's hair being blonde when not covered in blood. If Len looked close he could see a ring of cerulean blue around his blown pupils.

"Alright, I'm just going to help you-"

"I think I'm going to be sick." Jim tried, he really did to get up and run to the bathroom but his limbs seemed too long and the walls warped and suddenly he was throwing up. Len couldn't find it in himself to be angry. The kid was sick. When he was finished retching on the floor he sat back on the couch. "'m sorry, Bones."

Len didn't know who _Bones_ was but the kid did look a little better as he sat back.

"It's alright, Jim." He told him. "Now, I'm gonna take your shirt off the start cleaning these wounds, alright?" He mapped out everything he was going to do. He didn't know if Jim could remember anything about when he'd been attacked but it was better safe than sorry. "What happened?"

Jim shook his head again looking to clear it. "I was a'the bar. Drinkin'. An this guy got me'a drink an I drank it. I didn't feel good an I told 'im an he said we should go an I said sure so we left… I didn't feel s'good an I told 'im again but he wouldn't listen. I think I closed m'eyes and the next thing I know I'm in an alley an he… He tried to…" With this Jim shook his head again. "But I said _no_ but he kept _touchin'_ me an I pushed him. Then he-he hit m-me." His bottom lip started to tremble, tears welled in his eyes.

 _Jesus Christ,_ Len thought, horror struck. _Just when you thought the world couldn't get any shittier._

Len touched a few spots on Jim's side that had him hissing, okay then. Three… Four possible broken ribs. He grabbed for the alcohol container to disinfect before digging through his kit for a needle to suture all of the gashes on his chest.

It felt like hours later when he'd finished up the last of his cleaning and meager healing. Jim slurred here and there but the kid mostly remained silent. The smell of vomit that permeated the air didn't bother Len as he worked, compartmentalizing it to the back of his head. When he finally sat back on the coffee table Jim was more passed out than awake.

"Call 'e a ca-ab," his speech was so jumbled it sounded like garbles. Len really hoped the kid had thrown up most of whatever drug he'd been given but Len would just have to keep an eye on him.

"No," he said sternly. "You can stay here."

"Re'ly?" The boyish glee in Jim's owl like eyes gazed at him with too much innocents that this night had almost taken away. Len smiled at Jim, he really was an attractive guy under all that blood. Shifting him to the side, Len maneuvered Jim's head down to the couch making sure he stayed on his side then grabbed a blanket to cover him up. He should really get him to change clothes but Jim's eyes were already closing, his breathing evening out. In the morning they would have to talk about what happened, find out more about Jim and somehow convince him to go to the hospital to get looked at. But that wasn't for right now. Now Len sat back on the coffee table letting his elbows rest on knees.

"Get some sleep kid. I'll be here when you wake up."


End file.
